Weekly Update #174: WWH Setting, Location & Characters

Last Saturday, I went into a bit more detail as to how exactly our two current projects GENBA no Kizuna and Withering Without Hope are actually connected to one another. We’ve been mainly focusing on GENBA over the last few months, so I thought it would be the ideal topic to lead back into WWH, which I want to talk a bit more about today.

I haven’t really said or shown too much in regards to it yet, but let’s start off by reiterating some of the key facts:

The story takes place on December 23, 2010, almost exactly two months after the events of Broken Beyond Despair. Naturally, Raiko will be the main character again, but this time, there will also be a lot of focus on Nobara and Henjin, who will get a much bigger role. In a sense, this next installment is mostly their story.

In general, WWH will revolve a lot around the concept of “family”, not just in regards to those two. Obviously, I don’t want to get too deep into this now, but family relationships will play a center role in the story.

Of course, there will be some other returning characters along those three mentioned above, but there’s also going to be a bunch of new ones, some of which you’ve even heard of already (if you’ve played BBD and paid a bit of attention).

Throughout the game, “Kenji and his gang” as well as “Misaki Ginmaku” were mentioned on multiple occasions (Misaki being a kind of rival to Rie, who threw her own Halloween party on the same night). If you know me a little better, you could probably already imagine that those weren’t just random names I put in there. By the time I typed them out in the script, they were already planned to appear in the sequel.

Fun fact: Kenji and his gang were even supposed to attend Rie’s party originally, leading to an equal balance between male and female characters. However, since the cast had just grown way too big, I ended up kicking them out. Why specifically them will be a topic for when I actually get to introduce them, though.

In any case, in WWH you will get to meet them and patrons can even expect an early look at some of their design sketches soon!

Of course, I have also mentioned already that the police will be involved in the investigation this time around. That’s because unlike BBD, the setting is not a remote location that can easily be cut off from the outside world. This time, the story takes place right in the center of town, so… let’s talk a bit more about the location.

Back then, I didn’t really say what kind of place it is, but I guess you could figure it out by looking at this and keeping some of the keywords in mind, which were featured on the teaser pic. It’s the Ginmaku Movie Theater.

So yeah, WWH takes place at a small cinema in the center of town (the interior is actually designed after a small cinema nearby).
I’ve already started working on the first background image showing the outside of it and I hope to finish it very soon, so you can get an actual first look. That’s also when I will talk in a bit more detail about the place.

One thing I can already say, however, is that (as the name suggests) it is owned by Misaki Ginmaku’s father, who also lives there together with his daughter.

Anyway, I’d like to say a lot more but I also don’t want to reveal too much too soon. I really hope I’m gonna get that BG done ASAP, but for now, this year’s Christmas artwork has been a little more urgent. Speaking of which, I’ve now posted two WIP-glimpses of it over on Patreon!

In other news, Natsu has finished coloring all GENBA sprites for the demo, so all that’s left now are sound effects and coding work. I’m also going to work on the WWH script some more, so patrons can look forward to reading part of the prologue soon!

That’s it for today, so please enjoy the rest of your weekend and, until next Saturday, take care! :3